The Bombay High Court on Friday said that the Coronavirus pandemic has revealed that despite our constitutional guarantees, a society that provides equal opportunities to all remains a “distant dream” amid the migrant crisis and the COVID-19 outbreak.

The HC bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice AA Sayed also said that going by the current situation of the economy and health care, “one can hardly think of a fair society in the near future”.

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“The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed that despite our constitutional guarantees, a society that provides equal opportunities to all remains a distant dream,” the HC said.

The COVID-19 crisis and the lockdown have hit the Indian economy and shown how “pitiable” the condition of migrant workers in the country was, observed the bench.

The court on Friday issued a slew of directions while passing a verdict over a bunch of Public Interest Litigations (PILs) filed by several individuals and institutions seeking various reliefs for COVID and non-COVID patients, and frontline workers in Maharashtra.

The bench directed the Maharashtra government to consider increasing its healthcare budget and expenditure and also said that the state must give priority to emergencies while admitting patients.

“The pandemic and the resultant lockdown have destabilised the Indian economy, while wrecking the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ alike…It has shown how pitiable the conditions of migrant workers in India are…And as things stand now, one can hardly think of a fair and just society any time in the near future,” it said.

However, it was now time to learn a good lesson and prioritise strengthening the state”s healthcare system, it said.

Senior counsels Gayatri Singh, Mihir Desai, and advocate Ankit Kulkarni through whom the PIL was filed, sought adequate testing, PPEs for front-line workers, mobile health clinics, beds, health infrastructure, and a helpline for COVID and non-COVID patients.

The HC in its verdict directed the state government to continue testing and screening for coronavirus aggressively, to develop a “wholesome strategy” for dealing with positive patients of all classes, and to make available to the public real-time information on availability of beds, doctors, etc for both COVID and non COVID patients.

The court further said that though unavailability of beds was no excuse for refusing admission to patients, efforts shall be made to first admit those patients who “genuinely deserve treatment and care in hospitals in preference to others who out of fear may seek admission but can wait”.

Maharashtra remains the worst-hit state with with 1,01,141 coronavirus cases, followed by Tamil Nadu with 40,698 and Delhi with 36,824.

While India on Saturday crossed 3 lakh-mark as it reported the highest single-day spike of 11,458 new Coronavirus cases taking the total tally to 3,08,993. As many as 386 deaths were recorded in the last 24 hours taking the total number of fatalities to 8,884, according to the Ministry of Health.

Meanwhile, India is ranked fouth globally in the total cases of novel Coronavirus reported after Russia (5,10,761), Brazil (8,28,810) and the US (20,46,643).